Automatic strip coiler

ABSTRACT

An automatic strip coiler with a twist guide for turning the strip on edge and into an elongate strip guide. The strip guide is openable to form a looping box. The coiler has a rotating flywheel table with a split drum mounted thereon. An infrared sensor connected to a time delay mechanism opens the guide chutes to form a looping box when the strip end enters the split drum. At the same time, the flywheel table accelerates the split drum to commence winding the strip.

United States Patent T0 HYDRAULIC CYLINDERS 2211,221)

T0 HYDRAULIC TIME DELAY CYLINDER 52 RELAY -'ro COILER A HEAT SENSOR T0 ACTUATE GUIDES 160., 16b

inventor Calvin C. Williamson Costa Mesa, Calif. Appl. No. 767,947 Filed Oct. 16, 1968 Patented Mar. 2, 1971 Assignee Soule Steel Company San Francisco, Calif.

AUTOMATIC STRIP COILER 4 Claims, 3 Drawing Figs.

U.S. Cl 242/78.1, 242/76 Int. Cl B21c 47/04, B210 47/3 2 Field of Search 242/78. 1, 76

[56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 439,114 10/1890 Clifford 242/81 2,756,941 7/1956 Ranney 242/78.l 2,951,657 9/1960 Wallin 242/78.1

Primary ExaminerGeorge F. Mautz Assistant Examiner-Gregory A. Walters Attorney-Townsend and Townsend ABSTRACT: An automatic strip coiler with a twist guide for turning the strip on edge and into an elongate strip guide. The strip guide is openable to form a looping box. The coiler has a rotating flywheel table with a split drum mounted thereon. An infrared sensor connected to a time delay mechanism opens the guide chutes to form a looping box when the strip end enters the split drum. At the same time, the flywheel table accelerates the split drum to commence winding'the strip.

PATENTEDHAR 2mm 3,567,149

SHEET 1 OF 3 TO HYDRAULIC CYLINDERS 22a,22b lGa I web l3 l 1 28;: i 28 TO HYDRAULIC 20a 20b TIME DELAY CYLINDER s2 .]p1

ll- RELAY To COILER A l l HEAT SENSOR T0 ACTUATE GUIDES ISQ, |6b

I INVENTOR I I0 C. C. WILLIAMSON 1 BY ATTORNEY PATENTEU MAR 2197:

FlG 2 TIME DELAY RELAY GUIDES I61, l6b

HEAT SENSOR TD ACTUATE To HYDRAULIC CYLINDER 52 T0 CDILER A SHEET 2 BF 3 32cm )"-32b ISB I 36 L J 30 aob I I6Cl\ (I6b 28a 28b INVENTOR. C. C. WILLIAMSON ATTORNEYS PATENTED MAR 2 I97! SHEET 3 OF 3 INVENTOR.

C. C.W|LL|AMSON ATTORNEYS AUTOMATIC S'IRlill COIILER form hot steel billets into strip by rolling, usually feed the finished strip into a coiling apparatus. This coiling apparatus ordinarily comprises a motor driven coiler, an arrangement for removing the finished coils from the coiler, and a feed arrangement called a looping box. The looping box is an elongated table often as much as 50 feet long with parallel sides which permit the strip, which is fed at high speed from the mill to accumulate in a series of loops prior to being fed into the coiler. Such looping boxes are required because the leading end of the strip must be engaged with the collar while the coiler is stationary-This is a hand operation. The operator grabs the end of the strip-with tongs and engages the end in the winding mandrel. The mandrel is then rotated by starting the drive motors and the coil begins to be formed. While this operation is taking place the hot strip is being fed from the rolling mill at speeds of up to 2,000 feet per minute. Thus, an elongate looping box is required so that the hot strip may be accumulated prior to being coiled. Were there no place for the strip to be looped, the hot strip would likely twist and tangle into a mass of red hot spaghetti with possible disastrous consequences to the machinery and the operators.

The present invention is designed to eliminate the requirement for a conventional elongate looping box and operators to handle the strip by providing a coiler which is adapted tov receive the advancing tip of the hot strip and automatically commence coiling at the normal coilingspeed as soon as the tip is engaged by the coiler. This is accomplished in the present invention by providing a pair of strip guide chutes the hot rolled strip from the last stand 10 of the hot bar strip .mill and turns the strip 90. An infrared or heat sensor lll is mounted adjacent the final stand 10 of finishing rolls to sense the presence of the red hot strip as it reaches the final step of the rolling process and to actuate a time delay relay 13 which starts the coiling as the tip of the red hot strip reaches the coiler. The strip with its flat faces horizontal at the entrance 12. to the twist guide, exits at point 14 where the twist guide D is connected to the curve guide C with the strip vertically aligned. The strip passes along the arc of guide C to enter the v looping box guide chutes 16a and 16b.

Each guide chute 16a and 16b which together form a path through which the strip is directed toward the coiler, is pivotally mounted on a pair of support arms Ma and 18b and 20a and 20b. Each of the arms 18a, 18b, has a hydraulic cylinder 22aand 22b connected thereto, the piston rod 24a and 24b of each cylinder being in the extended position when the guide chutes 16a and 16b are closed. Both sets of support arms 18 and 20 are pivotally mounted on the brackets 26a and 26b and 28a and 28b to permit the chutes to be pivoted away from each other to form the looping box as is shown in FIG. 2.

which are openable to form a looping box together with a novel coiler having a rotating table which acts as a flywheel and which has a strip engaging element concentrically mounted at the center of the table. The strip receiving element has a strip engaging slot and is provided with means for maintaining the alignment of the slot with the guide chutes of the looping box. Thus, the tip of the hot strip will enter the slot without the necessity of an operator handling the strip. The coiler is also provided with a clutch mechanism which is actuated a preselected interval after the tip of the strip has passed the entrance to the coiling apparatus. Thus, upon entry of the tip into the slot the flywheel table is engaged'with the strip engaging element causing the element to commence rotation at normal coiling speed almost instantaneously.

As a result of the ability of the present coiler to receive and coil the hot strip as it is fed from the rolling mill automatically and without substantial delay, only a comparatively small looping box is required to accommodate occasional pulsations in the feed of the strip. Because the coiling apparatus is con siderably smaller than conventional coilers, a substantially smaller amount of floor space in the mill is required thus permitting much more efficient use of available working areas in the mill.

IN THE DRAWINGS vention is shown generally in FIG. 1. The invention comprises a coiler A and a strip guide B which is openable to form a looping box. Affixed to the entrance end of the strip guide B is a curved guide C and twist guide I). The twist guide D receives Upon actuation by the time delay relay 13 the hydraulic cylinders 22a and 22b will pull the piston rods 24a and'Z-t -b thus pivoting the guide chutes 16a and 16b to the open position to form a looping box.

Each of the guide chutes 16a and 16b is formed in the shape of a right angle having a flat leg portion 30 and a perpendicu lar portion 32, the height of the perpendicular leg 32 above the mounting table 34 being sufficient to fully support the maximum width of the strip passing between the chutes. In order to maintain proper strength of the guide chutes, a plurality of gussets 36 are welded in place inside the open portion of the right angle of the chutes.

At the end of the chutes 16a and 16b adjacent the coiler A is a pair of arcuate fixed guides 38a and 38b spaced from each other sufficiently to permit the'strip to pass through, and: al-

lochirally aligned, that is mounted so that one is a mirror image of the other. These fixed guides 38a and 38b together form the exit throat 10 of the looping box.

At the exit throat 40, between fixed guides 38a and 38b, a tension device is mounted. This tension device comprises a pair of rollers 42 and 44 mounted on vertical axes so that they will support strip passing across their respective circumferences. Opposite rollers 42 and 44 is a movable roller 46 also vertically mounted and supported on a bracket 48 adapted to pivot on vertical axle 50. The bracket 48 is connected to a small hydraulic cylinder 52 affixed to a support 54 mounted on the table 34. When hydraulic pressure is applied to cylinder 52, the bracket 48 carrying roller 46 is pivoted toward the pair of rollers 42 and 44 so that the strip passing between roller 46 and the roller pair is held under tension as it is drawn into the coiler A.

In FIG. l, the alignmnet of the coiler A adjacent the strip guide B is shown, The coiler comprises a circular table 56 with a concentrically mounted split drum 58 having a strip receiving slot 60 in the center thereof. I

At the entrance end 12 of the twist guide D and adjacent the last roll 10 of the mill is a heat sensor 11 to detect the heat radiating from the red hot strip as it passes into the final finishing roll and before it enters the twist guide. The heat sensor 11 actuates a time delay relay 13 to cause the guide chutes 16a and 16b to open after a preselected time interval. The relay will also cause the split drum 58 of the-coiler to commence rotation as the strip enters the slot 60; A complete description of the operation of the device follows a detailed description of the coiler A. I

The coiler A comprises a flywheel table 56 within which is concentrically mounted a split drum 58 having a slot therein for receiving the strip from the looping box. An alternate construction would utilize, instead of a split drum, a pair of posts spaced from each other in order to permit the strip to pass between the posts and be engaged thereby to commence the coiling operation. The flywheel table 56 is of substantial size and weight in order to store sufficient momentum to enable the split drum 58 to commence the coiling operation virtually instantaneously. The flywheel table is bolted to a coiling drum 62 which is also of substantial size and weight. The drum in turn is mounted on a bearing hub 64 within which a high capacity bearing 66 is mounted. The bearing house 64 is in turn bolted to a hollow quill shaft 68 upon which a multi V- belt sheave 70 is keyed to permit the flywheel table 56 to be rotated under power from a large electric motor (not separately shown).

The entire flywheel and drum assembly which is mounted on the quill shaft 68 is carried on support frame 72 within which are mounted sets of high capacity bearings 74 and 76. The bearings 74 and 76 fully support the quill shaft carrying the drum and flywheel assembly.

The split drum 58 is mounted by means of suitable bolts 78 to a mandrel frame 80 carried to a solid shaft 82. The shaft 82 is provided with external splines 84 engageable with internal splines 86 on the upper portion 88 of an intermediate hollow shaft mounted between the quill shaft 68 and the mandrel shaft 82. The lower portion 90 of the intermediate hollow shaft is pinned to the upper portion so that the two sections fon'n a virtually solid unit. Mounting the shaft 82 internally of the hollow shaft 88 with the respective splines 84 and 86 engaged permits the split drum 58 or the substitute pins to be raised and lowered relative to the face of the flywheel table 56. Thus, the split drum may be raised or lowered to accommodate varying widths of strip and still be rotated under power supplied through the intermediate shaft 88. This arrangement also permits the split drum to be lowered completely so that its upper surface 92 is flush with the face of the flywheel table. Lowering the split drum in such a manner permits the strip to be removed from the flywheel table by sliding the coil off the table.

On the lower portion of the sheave 70 is a concentric, cylindrical ring 94. A friction-material covered disc 96, which is part of a ventilated, air tube, disc clutch 98, is bolted to ring 94. The main portion 100 of the clutch is keyed by means of shaft key 102 to the lower portion 90 of the intermediate hollow shaft. The bellows 104 which actuates the clutch is sup plied with compressed air through tubes 106. Pressurizing the bellows will cause the disc 96 to be engaged by the main portion of the clutch thus causing the flywheel table and split drum to rotate together.

Mounted on the bottom of the shaft 82 is a notched cam plate 108 against which a spring loaded cam follower 109 is biased. The notch 107 in the cam plate 108 is aligned with the slot 60 in the split drum 58 so that when the rotating drum slows down, the spring biased cam follower will enter the notch on cam plate 108 with the result that the slot 60 will always be aligned in the same position with respect to the strip guide chutes when the split drum is at rest.

A separate supply of compressed air is available through tube 110 to an air operated plunger arrangement 112 which will draw shaft 82 downward under pneumatic pressure when the split drum 58 must be lowered either to remove the coil or strip or to accommodate narrower strip.

The operation of the apparatus may be more fully understood by the following description of the sequence of events as the strip is rolled and coiled. The initial operation is to place a heated steel billet on the conveyors of the rolling mill and begin feeding it through the series of rolling stands which will convert the billet into strip. The size of the billet is preselected by well known calculations based upon the desired width and thickness of this strip and its length. As the billet passes through each of the reducing stands it is compressed and at the same time its length increases proportionately. The speed of the strip as it exits from the final finishing roll stand may be as great as 2,000 feet per minute.

The preselected weight and size of the billet permits the nearly exact determination of the exit speed of the hot strip as it leaves the finishing rolls. A heat sensor 11 is mounted adjacent the final finishing roll in order to detect the red hot strip as it reaches the final step of the rolling process. From the final set of rolls 10 the strip, which is horizontally aligned in the rolling mill, passes into the entrance 12 of the twist guide D which turns the strip so that it is aligned vertically. The strip then passes into a fixed curve guide C and then enters the entrance space 15 between the looping box guide chutes 16a and 16b. The space between the guide chutes is slightly wider than the thickness of the strip so that the leading tip of the strip passes along the length of the chutes in a straight line through the exit throat 40 between fixed guides 38a and 38b and into the receiving slot 60 in the center of the split drum 58 on the coiler A.

Prior to the billet being fed into the rolling mill or simultaneously therewith, the drive motor for the coiler is started. The drive motor turns the sheave 70 which in turn causes the flywheel table 56 to rotate at the appropriate speed. Since the flywheel table is of substantial diameter and weight, there is a large amount of energy in the flywheel when it is rotating at its normal speed.

When the heat sensor 11 senses the presence of the red hot tip of the strip as it enters the finishing roll 10 it actuates a time delay relay 13. The time delay of the relay is determined by the calculated speed of the strip as it leaves the rolling mill. Thus, as soon as the tip of the strip is received in the slot 60 of the split drum 58 the time delay relay causes the coiler clutch 98 to be engaged so that the flywheel table with its high momentum is directly engaged to the split drum 58. The high momentum of the flywheel table will aid in bringing the split drum up to coiling speed almost instantaneously. The two units will then rotate as one under power from the motor through the V-belt sheave 70. Rotation of the split drum 58 with the tip of the strip caught in the slot 60 will cause the strip to accumulate around the outside diameter of the split drum and continue to be coiled until no more strip is received from the rolling mill.

Simultaneously with the actuation of the coiler the hydraulic cylinders 22a, 22b are actuated so that the guide chutes 16a and 16b are pivoted away from each other to form a looping box as may be seen in FIG. 2. At the same time, hydraulic cylinder 52 is actuated thus pivoting roller 46 toward rollers 42 and 44 passing the strip between the rollers and causing it to be held under slight tension as the strip is drawn into the coiler. Because the strip is travelling at substantial speed and the diameter of the mandrel is comparatively small, the coiling operation may not be sufficiently fast to take up the strip as fast as it is being fed from the rolling mill. The looping box will permit any excess strip to accumulate in loop form, as may be seen by the broken lines in FIG. 2. The coiler continues to draw the hot strip upon itself, the linear feeding speed onto the coil increasing as the diameter of the coil increases until the strip is being drawn into the coiler at the same rate as it is being fed from the rolling mill.

I claim:

1. Apparatus for coiling strip comprising: means for guiding the strip toward a coiler, said coiler comprising a pair of spaced apart, coil receiving elements, said elements provided with means for aligning the space therebetween so that the strip end is received in the space and engaged between the elements when the coiler begins to rotate, means for accumulating excess strip prior to its being drawn into the coiler, power means for rotating the coiler, flywheel means for storing energy from the power means, said flywheel means freely rotatably while the coil receiving elements are stationary, and means for connecting the flywheel means to the coil receiving elements so that the coil receiving elements are substantially instantaneously accelerated to the speed required for coiling the advancing strip.

2. Apparatus for coiling strip comprising: means for guiding the strip toward a coiler, means for accumulating excess strip prior to its being drawn into the coiler, means for receiving and substantially instantaneously commencing coiling the strip, said guide means comprising a pair of opposed, pivotally mounted guide chutes for receiving the strip, means for openthe leading tip of strip moving into the coiler, said engaging means stationary when the tip is engaged; means for causing the engaging means to commence rotation at the speed at which the coil is moving as soon as the tip is engaged by the engaging means; a rotatable table, said table having substantial weight and acting as a flywheel; the engaging means rotatable and mounted coaxially with the table, the upper portion of said engaging means elevated above the face of the table, said engaging means provided with spaced apart strip-engaging elements, the space having sufficient width to receive the end of the strip therein; means for stopping the rotatable engaging means so that the space is aligned in the same relative position for receiving the strip; and means for connecting the table to the engaging means during rotation of the table so that the engaging means will be rotated and will wind the strip upon itself.

4. The coiler of claim 3 and wherein the engaging means may be moved axially relative to the table and including means for moving said engaging means so that the upper surface of the engaging means and the surface of the table are coplanar to permit the coiled strip to be removed from the table. 

1. Apparatus for coiling strip comprising: means for guiding the strip toward a coiler, said coiler comprising a pair of spaced apart, coil receiving elements, said elements provided with means for aligning the space therebetween so that the strip end is received in the space and engaged between the elements when the coiler begins to rotate, means for accumulating excess strip prior to its being drawn into the coiler, power means for rotating the coiler, flywheel means for storing energy from the power means, said flywheel means freely rotatably while the coil receiving elements are stationary, and means for connecting the flywheel means to the coil receiving elements so that the coil receiving elements are substantially instantaneously accelerated to the speed required for coiling the advancing strip.
 2. Apparatus for coiling strip comprising: means for guiding the strip toward a coiler, means for accumulating excess strip prior to its being drawn into the coiler, means for receiving and substantially instantaneously commencing coiling the strip, said guide means comprising a pair of opposed, pivotally mounted guide chutes for receiving the strip, means for opening the guide chutes comprising a hydraulic cylinder connected to each chute for pivoting the chutes away from each other, means for sensing the proximity of the leading tip of the strip, and time delay means connected to the sensing means and preset to open the guide chutes when a preselected time interval has elapsed after the tip has passed the sensing means.
 3. A coiler for coiling strip comprising: means for engaging the leading tip of strip moving into the coiler, said engaging means stationary when the tip is engaged; means for causing the engaging means to commence rotation at the speed at which the coil is moving as soon as the tip is engaged by the engaging means; a rotatable table, said table having substantial weight and acting as a flywheel; the engaging means rotatable and mounted coaxially with the table, the upper portion of said engaging means elevated above the face of the table, said engaging means provided with spaced apart strip-engaging elements, the space having sufficient width to receive the end of the strip therein; means for stopping the rotatable engaging means so that the space is aligned in the same relative position for receiving the strip; and means for connecting the table to the engaging means during rotation of the table so that the engaging means will be rotated and will wind the strip upon itself.
 4. The coiler of claim 3 and wherein the engaging means may be moved axially relative to the table and including means for moving said engaging means so that the upper surface of the engaging means and the surface of the table are coplanar to permit the coiled strip to be removed from the table. 